


The Last Single Days of Shandris Feathermoon

by shelter



Category: Warcraft - All Media Types, World of Warcraft
Genre: Ashenvale, F/F, Post Fourth War, Post-BfA, War of the Thorns | Burning of Teldrassil
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-28
Updated: 2020-06-28
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:21:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,960
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24959821
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shelter/pseuds/shelter
Summary: As the Kaldorei struggle to recover from the war on their homeland, Shandris Feathermoon deals with unrequited love and an abandoned infant left in her care.
Relationships: Shandris Feathermoon/Maiev Shadowsong
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21





	The Last Single Days of Shandris Feathermoon

**Author's Note:**

> This is a slightly edited version of a story written for the Fanfiction Bingo on the Purple Parlor discord group. My prompts were "snow", "catastrophe", "anger", "feast" and "Silvermoon".

_"O delight of my eye!  
Look into my chest:  
You will find a hollow  
unguarded by shields,  
washed with tears and  
adorned with candles."  
_\- **'Ya Ahla Ayoun'** , Jadal  
(Translated from the Arabic)

* * *

.

.

Every month, on the full moon, Shandris Feathermoon waits at Falfarren River for her beloved.

It has been almost a year since the Horde's blitzkrieg and the sacking of Teldrassil. Much of Ashenvale still remains a suburb of fire-eaten ruins, torched trees and discarded Horde military paraphernalia. Now, deep in the throes of winter, green of the forest lies drenched in a subtle shroud of white. To Shandris, it looks more like ash than snow.

On her hippogryph, Anelle, the infant Shandris found, grabs at the falling whiskers of snow, her tiny arms swabbing the air.

"Snow," she says.

From their position behind the trees, Shandris frowns. But she doesn't have a heart to quiet Anelle. All she does is drop her bow and run her cold fingers across her small patch of hair. The other Sentinels, longbows drawn, take aim at the dark mould of fog slumped over the river.

A whistle from the south bank. The slapping of wings. Shandris and her Sentinels aim at a stainless grey blurb emerging from the trees: an owl.

The High Priestess and her Wardens have arrived.

By the light of the moon, an incandescent bridge emerges over Falfarren River. On both banks, Kaldorei warriors reveal themselves. It's a brief, monthly reunion, for fighters who've lost so much, to exchange news and supplies.

Shandris hugs her fellow sisters. She's looking for her beloved amidst the dark, snow-flecked bodies when one figure heads directly for her, aglow in a long trapezoid of moonlight as if Elune herself were following her every step. On her back, she carries a crescent-shaped blade bearded with dried blood like a perverse face.

"High Priestess," says Shandris.

"Sentinel-General. What news from Darkshore?"

Shandris tells her. She tells High Priestess Tyrande Whisperwind of the Horde ships hiding in the horizon off Darnassus. She tells of the Kaldorei refugees' slow return, of Shando Stormrage's recovery, of their work rebuilding the towns.

The High Priestess just nods. No words of encouragement. No smiles. No embrace. Her response is succinct and stiff like a military report:

"We are driving the Horde south and reaping blood for every inch of land we recover."

Then she's gone, returning to the far side of the river, calling for her army to follow.

Shandris sighs. She turns to look for her beloved, reaching out to one of the High Priestess's wardens.

"Have you seen Maeiv Shadowsong?" she asks her.

The warden gestures back towards Ashenvale.

When she returns to her hippogrpyh, she finds Maeiv waiting with Anelle, staring at the child as if she were an exotic piece of fruit.

"Mah-evv," Anelle says, her open left hand trying to grasp the end of Maiev's armoured gauntlet.

"She remembers," Maiev says.

"Of course. She spends all her day with me."

"Still no news?"

"No one has come to claim her."

In her Warden's armour, Maiev is a dark mountain of rust-bitten steel and leather, her muscles massing underneath. Tonight, she's removed her helmet, but not her mouth-guard, so her face tapers down to a wedge of armour like a monstrous beak. Shandris sees the moonlight lick Maiev's face: the freckles like burnt sand on her lower cheek, the hole-punched ears, the ruined landscape of her scalp bearing a scar razor-ed asymmetrically into her head –

An urgent whistle from the forest across the river. Time to go.

So many things to say, so little time.

Maeiv locks eyes with her in a determined, hawkish glare.

"Shandris, I wanted to–"

This is Maeiv, a monsoon of perpetual fury in battle, Shandris thinks, but she always seems lost for words when they meet.

The whistle again. Maeiv shakes her head. She dons her helmet. The armour swallows her face, leaving just two slits of wrathful eyes.

"Ande'thoras-ethil, Maiev."

She touches Maiev's elbow and kisses the side of her helmet, as the warden marches back across the river.

"Be safe, I love you," Shandris says.

"Safe," Anelle says.

But her fingers and lips are cold with the harshness of skin touching steel.

* * *

With her Sentinels, Shandris patrols the destroyed settlements from Astranaar north to Darkshore. At a holding area opposite the black monument of death that is Teldrassil, they drop off prisoners. Then they accompany returning refugees to towns slowly being repopulated. They guard their traumatized Kaldorei kin. They safeguard the routes in and out of Ashenvale. They eliminate any Horde infiltrators. They execute any Trolls or Forsaken on sight.

It was on one of these loops that Shandris found Anelle.

She had been helping two families secure their homes on the outskirts of Astranaar. They cleared the dwellings of rubble and bones of slain Orcs, embedded in the snowy dirt like lost teeth. The task done, she walked back to her hippogryph and found a baby nestled in the saddle.

Not only had her hippogryph allowed someone to sneak up on her, but there were no footprints in the snow.

They asked all the villagers, then the remaining townsfolk on Astranaar. They alerted all the other Sentinel squadrons, even the Wardens with Tyrande.

But no one claimed her.

"We can't keep her," Shandris said.

"Well, we can't," Cordressa Briarbow, her second-in-command said. "But you can."

"She won't survive the trip back to Darkshore."

To their surprise, Anelle slept all the way. Hands bent in the shape of sleep, she grasped at Shandris's arm, her knuckles like tiny pale hills.

"Boom," she said. "Boom."

A few trips later and Shandris's lost infant had become the newest recruit in her squad. She developed a liking to the flying torrent of cold wind. She never seemed to lose interest in bright things: anything celestial, the pointed reflection from a nocked arrowhead, drifting snow, the moon on the water like a quivering silver fish–

Sometimes, Shandris has doubts. Would the child survive an ambush? What if she gave away their position in an assault?

But then she sees her fat, watery smile, as if she wants nothing in the world save to be curled on Shandris's back. And Shandris decides to tackle that problem when it arises.

Cordressa names her Anelle – 'gentle snow' in a local Darnassian dialect – because she is always trying to paw at parachuting snowflakes.

* * *

Shandris and her Sentinels head north, past the skeletons of burnt bridges and rivers overflowing with an armada of drowned debris. Even in places deep in Ashenvale, where the Horde invasion overlooked, the signs of war are visible: the woods are devoid of wisps, the trees all look naked against the snow.

Their route brings them into the heart of the forest, south of Mount Hyjal. Here, Shandris leads her squad to a small sanctuary. Her Sentinels relish this diversion, because they know they will get to rest and have an opportunity to commune with their Shando. 

They land in a glade and lead their hippogryphs to a Moonwell. Shandris ties Anelle to her back, in a strapping hold that accommodates her bow and quiver. Then she heads into the sanctuary.

Shando Malfurion Stormrage's still recovering from the wounds he received at Darkshore. Shandris finds him coaxing ferns from the snow-scattered earth. A dull red rift of where Varok Saurfang struck him still bursts from between his antlers.

"Ishnu-alah, my daughter!" he says.

Surrounding him, various Tauren and Orc helpers ground rice flour to make into cakes, seasoned with winter herbs. Shandris doesn't understand why Shando Stormrage surrounds himself with these enemies, and it worries her.

But he insists they've been reformed. Their penance: making food stores for the winter.

A Tauren looks up at her and nods. One of the orcs tries to coo at Anelle. Shandris flashes the steel of her dagger in response.

"Shando," Anelle mumbles.

"My, my are you beautiful," Shando Stormrage says, dangling his feathers over Anelle. "Still no word of her family?"

"I'm afraid not. She's still lost."

"Well, that makes all of us," says the Tauren, pounding rice flour.

Shando Stormage smiles. He moves slowly, as if fighting against a current of water with each step, while attending to the trees.

Shandris thinks all of them – the reformed Horde helpers, her Shando, Anelle – are all lost, casualties of the war.

"I hope you're treating her well?" Shando Stormrage asks, his attention turning back to her and Anelle.

"She's like a Sentinel. She–"

"Because the battlefield is no place for a cub, Shandris."

"Shando, we spoke about this."

"We did."

"We need to keep our lands safe."

"Of course we need to," Shando Stormrage says. Then he lowers himself till he's seeing eye-to-eye with Shandris. "But you don't."

"I'm the Sentinel-General."

"A general doesn't need to be in the field every moon."

"I can't. The Kaldorei need me on the front. So does Tyrande."

The mention of Tyrande softens Shando Stormrage's face even more. But when he speaks he does so with the deep bass voice of his authority.

"Shandris," he says. "So does Anelle."

"Take her then. You can give her a good home. I've to fulfill my mission."

Shando Stormrage smiles again, a gentle gesture of understanding. With a flick of his fingers, a mattress of herbs and flowers blooms from his feet. He whispers to the growing shrub. It yields him a purple flower. He tucks it behind Anelle's ear.

"Elune sent Anelle to you," he says. "Until her parents and her fate is decided are found, she's your mission."

* * *

Shandris emerges from her Shando's sanctuary with purple flowers for her Sentinels and enough rice flour cakes to last beyond Winter's Veil. Her Shando gave her instructions to distribute them to every settlement from Darkshore or Ashenvale.

"How's Shando Stormrage?" Cordressa asks.

"Well – you know."

"Head still in the trees?"

Shandris nods. Like her Sentinels, she sometimes wonders at the strange polarity of the High Priestess and her Shando: one gutting their enemies, the other getting them to make snacks.

Then she thinks of her own relationship with Maeiv. And she sighs as Anelle stirs, tugging at her hair. 

She's not going to let thoughts of Maeiv bother her. Not now.

Shandris and her Sentinels spend the next few nights fulfilling her Shando's wish. They make sure the returning Kaldorei have enough rice to last them till the next full moon. They encourage the refugees, consecrate Moonwells and chase away a pack of satyrs.

As they return to Darkshore to accompany another band of returnees, they stop at the holding area for prisoners-of-war.

The holding area is really the old Horde encampment, overrun when the High Priestess and Maeiv reclaimed Darkshore for the Kaldorei. Here, a gaggle of prisoners lounge amidst the ruins, cleaning up a kilometre-long flesh and metal sandwich that was once a retreating column of the Horde's siege engines.

She walks among the withdrawn prisoners. Most of them are Sin'dorei, some in various states of magic withdrawal. Talks with Silvermoon to repatriate them stalled months ago.

While she's loathe to deliver them rations and food meant for those who've suffered from Horde warmongering, Shandris isn't not going to let them starve to death during winter. Not under her watch.

She orders her Sentinels to commandeer the porch of a ruined house. Its walls are perforated like lace, and a fire-blackened corpse lies twisted into a grotesque black flower in one of the rooms. But they call the prisoners over, and dump the rice flour cakes and a few bottles of wine on the ground.

If the prisoners are happy with the feast, they don't show it. A few of the Sin'dorei nod and pay their respects to her as a Kaldorei commander. She's learnt that she'll not find any goodwill among their kind.

Shandris is about to leave when one of the Sin'dorei prisoners says, "Isn't that Lisryeth?"

She seizes the edges of the straps, bringing Anelle to her bosom in a defensive stance. At the same time, she draws an arrow and turns to the Sin'dorei who's shadowing her. Her Sentinels do the same.

"Wait! Wait!"

"Get down and raise your hands!" Cordressa yells.

At once all the prisoners are on their feet, the feast forgotten. With an almost equal number of Sentinels to prisoners, Shandris imagines: this could end up in a massacre.

So she decides to de-escalate. She lowers her weapons, and approaches the prisoner.

"What did you want with me?" she asks.

His hands raised, he nods at Anelle. "That's Lisryeth. Our Ranger-Captain's child."

Shandris's stomach knots. Her Sentinels look to her.

"You're lying."

"Sentinel-General, with all due respect, I know a Sin'dorei child when I see one," he says, bearing a canine-looking grin. "Plus I was assigned to watch her."

"You did a _great_ job."

"Your Sentinels surprised us. We were guarding the siege engines when we ambushed."

Shandris understands. After all, she led the attack that destroyed all those machines.

"And your Ranger-Captain is reckless, bringing her child to the front."

"She had her during the battle."

"What?"

"When the Dark Lady calls, you answer. We Sind'orei don't want to be accused of disloyalty."

"That's convenient," says one of her Sentinels.

"We're all logistics runners, my Lady," he says, stares at them directly. "Why do you think we surrendered?"

Shandris regards him. He has no reason to lie: he wasn't likely to survive the winter if Shandris didn't arrive with food. She looks down at Anelle, who thumbs her chest.

"Snow," Anelle says.

"So where's her mother now?" Shandris asks.

"How in the Sunwell would I know? Maybe she's dead. Maybe she's in Quel'Thalas."

When Shandris hardens her face, he points at Anelle again.

"Look," he says. "I don't care what happens to me. But if you care about her welfare, you should be looking for her mother."

"So you're giving me commands now?"

"You're the Sentinel-General."

She thanks the prisoner for his information. Before she can decide what to do next, Anelle looks up at her and says, "Min'da."

* * *

Shandris and her Sentinels escort returnees all the way back to Astranaar. While Cordressa helps the Kaldorei settle in, she cradles Anelle and brings her into the quiet vicinity of a Moonwell.

Anelle wriggles free of her grip. She wades into the shallow waters of the Moonwell, and Shandris holds her breath as wisps immediately congregate on the infant's head. But Anelle treats them gently. Soon, she obtains a crown of wisps as she waddles in the waters, swaddled with the moon-bright light of Elune.

Shandris watches, seeing the moonlight play off Anelle's dolphin-smooth skin.

Would she treat Anelle any differently if she were actually 'Lisryeth', a Sin'dorei child? No.

After all, Shandris thinks Anelle does look a little fair for a Kaldorei.

What responsibility does she have for her? To raise her in the ways of the Kaldorei? To seek out her true identity?

Shandris sighs. She wishes she could talk to Maiev right now.

Instead, she looks at the wisps dancing around Anelle, the infant splashing in the water below the blood-freckled arch of the Moonwell. The birds are gossiping in the trees. Everywhere Shandris looks, she sees wounds – the bone-thin hands of scorched trees, the dark earth pockmarked with rusting arrowheads – of a brutal war.

 _Until her parents are found, she's your mission_ , Shando told her.

"Min'da," Anelle says.

* * *

So Shandris sends messengers to the High Priestess and Shando Stormrage, telling them of her expected absence from the field. She gets a Sentinel to ask ahead for a Highborne mage in Astranaar. She confronts Cordressa and tells her of her plans.

"Congratulations on your promotion, Sentinel-General Briarbow," she says.

"You're joking!" Cordressa says. Shandris isn't. "I can't lead the entire Sentinel Command."

"Pretend to then. Until I get back."

When the mage finally gets summoned, he's stunned by her request for a portal.

"Silvermoon?" he tries to clarify.

"Yes."

"I haven't opened a portal to Quel'Thalas in almost five thousand years."

"Well I hope you still remember."

As the mage figures out the portal, she brings Anelle/Lisryeth to say goodbye to her Sentinels. The hippogryphs nuzzle her. Cordressa gifts her a moon necklace.

"Go with the blessings of Elune!" her Sentinels say.

Shandris is almost ready to go when the air beside her sparkles and sizzles – and Maiev blinks into corporeality at her side. She's a wreck of dirt and sweat, the sound of her breath guzzling through her armour.

"I made it – as soon as I could," Maeiv says.

"Glad you came."

"So Anelle's a Sin'dorei huh?"

"Lisryeth, you mean. No idea. But I want to find out. For her."

"You were always the one who cared."

"So – will you be sending us off? Or do you have something to say this time?"

Shandris runs her hand along the folds of her armour, her fingers splayed like a spider against the bulk of Maeiv's breastplate. Maeiv doesn't move. Shandris wonders if she can feel her touch, curled in the centre of her chest.

"I – umm – Shandris, I'm not sure what to say –"

But Anelle/Lisryeth reaches out to Maiev and touches her hand. In response, Maeiv removes her gauntlets and allows her to direct her smallest finger into her tiny mouth.

"Mah-ev," Anelle/Lisryeth says.

"She only ever says your name," Shandris says.

"Only because she takes after her protector."

Anelle/Lisryeth's eyes dart to the movement of the portal. Shandris wants Maeiv to say goodbye for a change. But then she feels the meaty lump of Maiev's bare hand on her abdomen.

So she takes it, her hand sheltered in Maeiv's clammy palm. And with Anelle/Lisryeth raptured by the portal's light, she guides them through to Silvermoon together.

.

.

_END_

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I would love any feedback if you have any!


End file.
